


Allura's Twelve

by windscryer



Series: Maja's Fluff VLD Week 2017 [4]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Cultural References, Fluff, Garrison Trio friendship - Freeform, Gen, Movie Night, Voltron Fluff Week 2017, but allura is trying, leadership is hard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-15
Updated: 2017-04-15
Packaged: 2018-10-19 03:53:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10631625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windscryer/pseuds/windscryer
Summary: The Paladins learn that while there are a great many differences between Earth and Altean culture, movie genres are not one of them. Some things are just universal.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is for the Voltron Fluff Week 2017 Day 4: Movie Night.

“Good work, Paladins,” Allura said, wiping sweat from her brow with the back of one wrist. The only one of the five humans who was still upright at all was Shiro and he looked like he was standing by sheer force of will.

Even as she watched, he swayed a little before he visibly forced himself to stop. Given where he’d done the majority of his training, that was an unhappy—if unsurprising—observation.

But, for all that they still had so much work to do, she was proud of them. She herself was leaning on her staff, the exhaustion seeping deep into her bones. She would sleep well tonight, of that she was sure.

Remembering what Shiro had suggested the last time they had made significant progress, she said, “I think we’ll end training here for today.”

Lance punched a fist up in the air from where he was sprawled on his back, Hunk gave a soft, “Yay,” and even Keith exhaled a sigh of relief. The puddle of green and white armor that was Pidge seemed to melt further into the ground in what Allura hoped was happiness and not unconsciousness.

“If you are all not too tired,” she continued, “I thought we might have another ‘movie night’.”

That was an energizing thought, it seemed, because Lance popped up almost immediately, a grin stretching his face. “For real?” Hunk pushed up at his side and they exchanged a high-five.

“Can we shower first?” Keith asked. “I feel like we’re back on Denivar IV.”

Everyone made a face or sound of disgust and Allura was not exempt. The whole castle had smelled of the planet’s swampy stench for weeks.

“It is a requirement, yes,” she said. “Let’s all clean up and meet in the lounge. Coran, can you prepare some food?”

“I’ll help,” Hunk volunteered immediately. “I can shower fast. Give me like ten dobashes?”

“I would appreciate the assistance,” Coran said, though the twitch of his mustache said he knew it wasn’t purely Hunk’s selfless nature that prompted his offer. “You lot are like a herd of sworvargels in a field of prindel flowers after a good training session!”

“Did he say Pringles?” Lance asked as he and Hunk helped each other to their feet. “Oh man, now I’m craving potato chips.” They stopped where Pidge was still laying down and Lance nudged her with the toe of his boot and stuck out a hand. “Come on, Pidge.”

“Leave me to die,” she moaned, but it was clearly not serious and Allura rolled her eyes, even as she crossed to where Keith had gotten himself to his knees and stopped to stare off into the distance.

Lance and Hunk snickered and, after a shared grin and glance, bent down and grabbed Pidge’s hands hauling her upright and beyond into the air.

“Whoa!” she protested and then wobbled when they set her back down on her feet. They held on for a second, then Lance shifted his grip to wrap around her back under her arms.

“Just move your feet, Hunk and I will keep you upright.”

She slumped into his side and they started shuffling toward the door. “If you loved me, you’d carry me piggyback.”

Allura glanced up from where she had bent over to see if Keith’s glazed eyes meant he had fallen asleep when she heard the yelp.

Lance was settling Pidge’s legs around his waist and Hunk had a hand on her back.

“You don’t really have to,” she said, but she didn’t sound like she meant it, her chin coming to rest on his shoulder.

“No, but now you owe me one,” Lance said as they walked out the door. She missed whatever grumbled reply Pidge gave to that.

“Keith?” she said, laying a hand on his shoulder. He startled and then blinked up at her.

“Sorry, Allura,” he said, grimacing as he continued his attempt to get to his feet. “What did you say?”

She shook her head, smiling. “I just wanted to make sure you were still awake.”

He grunted, but when she offered him a hand, he only glanced between it and her face once before accepting.

“Sorry,” he said again, letting go as soon as he was upright to wipe his hand on his uniform.

She gave him an amused look. “I’m no stranger to sweat, Keith,” she teased as they turned toward the door. Shiro was waiting for them, leaning on the wall by the open exit, and fell into step as they passed.

It was a quiet but companionable walk to the intersection of the hallways where Allura turned right and the paladins turned left. She chewed on her thoughts as they went and as Keith and Shiro moved to split off she said, “Keith?”

He paused, looking back.

“You may skip the movie tonight if you want to. You worked very hard in training this afternoon.”

He frowned for a long second, then relaxed, shrugging. “It’s fine. I like movies.”

She nodded, happy to hear his answer. She knew from that first food fight that humans, like Alteans, bonded as much through recreation as training, but Keith was not entirely like his teammates—and not just because of his Galran heritage. She wanted to make sure that he was coming because he wanted to, not because he felt obligated to.

Shiro was giving her a tired but proud smile and she returned it, then nodded.

“I’ll see all of you in the lounge soon then.”

They both waved and continued down the hall toward their quarters as she turned toward her own.

* * *

 “So whose turn is it to pick?” Lance asked as Allura stepped into the room. She was a little surprised to see that most of the them had beaten her here, but then she _had_ taken her time cleaning up, enjoying the feeling of well-earned fatigue settling into her muscles.

It had been too long since she last had a workout that satisfying. And knowing that Voltron was growing stronger, that her Paladins were growing more worthy and capable of the task laid before them was invigorating.

And perhaps made her a little nostalgic.

“I thought we might watch something from the archives,” she suggested.

More than one of them perked up at that—though they all looked much less worn out than they had when she’d last seen them.

“Wait, there are Altean movies?” Lance said.

“They’re not more educational videos are they?” Hunk asked, wary. Keith gave a snort of laughter at that.

“Well, there are many of those,” Allura said, letting her lips curve upward, “but there was a movie I enjoyed watching with my father… It’s a silly thing, but you have shared many of your movies with me.” She hesitated, feeling suddenly self-conscious and a little selfish. “Of course, we don’t have to, we can watch another of your movies, if you would like.”

“I’d like to see it,” Pidge said. She looked at the others and shrugged. “Between us, we have a lot of Earth movies, but eventually we’ll run out and we’ve probably all seen most of them. Something new would be nice.”

“As long as it’s not Coran explaining more alien biology,” Hunk said. “No offense,” he added, looking at him.

“None taken,” Coran said. “I understand if you can only take so much of this,” he added, flexing and preening.

Allura rolled her eyes, but she was happy to hear the others laugh with fond affection.

“Yeah,” Keith said. “ _That_ was it.”

“Sorry I’m late,” Shiro said as he entered. “What are we watching?”

“Allura’s pick,” Lance said.

Shiro looked at her with curiosity.

“You have shared so much with us, I thought it fair to share some of our movies with you.”

His expression softened with a smile. “I’m sure it will be great.”

“Have a seat then, I’ll queue it up.”

The lights dimmed as she found her spot between Coran and Pidge on the couch, a bowl of some kind of crunchy salty-sweet treat in the bowl in her lap and a blanket tucked in around her legs.

It wasn’t exactly like watching movies with her father, but it was still good.

* * *

The screen went dark and the lights slowly came up and Allura found herself nervous. There had been some urgent, hushed whispering between Hunk and Lance about twenty dobashes in, but other than that and some vigorous slapping of shoulders and elbowing of sides throughout, there hadn’t been much vocal commentary.

Considering how much the humans tended to talk during their own movies, Allura wasn’t sure if this was a good thing or a bad thing.

“Okay, but why didn’t he just shapeshift?” Pidge demanded. “I mean, obviously it would have torpedoed the entire plot, but in-universe it doesn’t make sense. He could have kept more loot for himself _and_ he wouldn’t have run the risk of being betrayed.”

“That would have ruined all the fun!” Coran protested. He’d made a sound of surprise when he’d realized what movie it was, then squeezed Allura’s arm and gave her a look of understanding before leaning back and letting himself be thoroughly engrossed in the movie.

“Yeah, Pidge,” Lance said. He was still grinning widely and his leg bounced in place. “Why doesn’t Danny Ocean just dig his way into the Bellagio’s vault?”

“Well that would just be impractical,” she said. "Someone would have noticed."

Hunk snorted. “Because an elaborate Rube Goldbergian plot that involves setting off an EMP in Las Vegas was sooooo much more sensible and _definitely_ slipped under the radar.”

Pidge’s eyebrows rose. “Obviously not, but there are still much easier ways to rob someone blind. And the humiliation factor can still be preserved. This is just asking to be caught.”

“Yeah, in a good hacker movie you can,” Lance said, waving a hand. “That’s a totally different genre than heist flicks, though. The ridiculousness of the scheme is at least half of the point.”

“I agree with Pidge,” Keith said. She held out a fist and he bumped it with his own. “That was a plot hole big enough to fly Red through.”

“Shapeshifting would be cheating,” Allura said. “And his Commander would have immediately known it was him anyway. He never would have gotten past the inner security station. That’s why he recruited Filleran.”

Pidge’s head tilted and Keith sat forward a little.

“You can tell someone’s shapeshifted?” he asked.

“Someone who was familiar with you could,” Allura said, blinking at the sudden reminder that humans couldn’t shift. “Everyone has a… way of doing it, a style I guess you could say. You can fool strangers, but close friends and family can tell.”

“There were, of course, really good shapeshifters where it was impossible for anyone to tell,” Coran said, “and some of them took up, ah, less than noble careers, but mostly they worked in the Intelligence Directorate.”

Everyone stopped and suddenly stared at Coran. Allura scanned them all and wondered what he’d said.

“You have spies?” Lance asked, his voice low and scandalized. “And you _didn’t tell us?_ ”

“Er, well, I mean,” Coran stammered, glancing at her for help. She shrugged, unsure of the issue. She herself had used her abilities to infiltrate the Galra on a mission with them.

“Waitwaitwait,” Pidge said, sitting up and turning sideways. “Does this mean you have _spy movies_ ? Is there an Altean James Bond? Because if so, we need to watch it. _Now._ ”

“I don’t know what a 'James Bond' is,” Coran admitted, but Shiro took pity on him and explained with a chuckle.

“He’s a famous fictional spy on Earth. There are books and a couple of series of movies. It’s kind of like this,” he added, nodding at the screen. “Movies that have action and humor and are not very realistic but are pretty entertaining.”

“Oh!” Coran said, perking up. “Like Verana Mornil!” He tilted his head and regarded Allura. “Not the most accurate representation of Altean culture, no, but a good story.”

“Father would disagree with you,” she said wryly, “but then he always liked Ghiralli’s tales better.”

“Well of course he did. Your father was a romantic at heart.”

Allura smiled, relieved that the thought of her father didn’t hurt as much as she had expected.

“This is great,” Lance said, practically vibrating in his seat and bringing her attention back to the present. “This is the best thing I’ve heard all year. We are _definitely_ watching more Altean movies.”

“That would be wonderful,” Allura agreed, pleased that they had enjoyed the movie and that they wanted to watch more. “But not tonight. I want to do more paired scenarios tomorrow and I don’t want any of you using lack of sleep as an excuse not to do your best.”

There was a whole chorus of groans, but Shiro just gave her a lopsided smile. “You heard the Princess,” he said. “Time to turn in.”

For all their vocal complaining, they rose and shuffled off to bed readily enough.

She watched them go with pleasure and pride in her chest, feeling a surge of affection for these humans from a distant star. It had been a good day and, she thought with hope in her heart, tomorrow would be even better.


End file.
